

ESSEX OPPOSITE GRAVESEND. 



[T. II. p. i.] The year 1748. 

 The 6th July. 



In the morning, in company with the then Pastor of 

 the Swedish Congregation in London, Master Tobias 

 Bidrck, and an English gentleman, I crossed over the 

 river Thames to Essex, to see the country there. Directly 

 we were across the river there was about an English 

 mile of quite lowland to walk over before we came up to 

 where it began to be hilly. 



This low-lying land has, in former times, been part of 

 the river Thames, but is now, through the earth-walls 

 and banks which are cast up on the banks of the river, 

 separated from the same, and turned to account, and 

 divided into arable fields, meadows, and pastures. 



When it is High Water in the river, which happens 

 twice in the twenty-four hours, the surface of the water 

 commonly stands much higher than these lowland plains, 

 so that if the aforesaid earth-walls did not exist, the water 

 would then overflow the whole of them, and cause these 

 great plains to resemble a vast lake. 



The whole of this low-lying land was [T. II. p. 2] 

 divided into different portions by deep ditches about 

 a fathom wide, which was done to lead off the water and 

 drain the land. Besides that, these dikes here performed 



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